People were actually clambering down the piers of the bridge from
above.
When, an hour later, a Martian appeared beyond the Clock Tower and
waded down the river, nothing but wreckage floated above Limehouse.
Of the falling of the fifth cylinder I have presently to tell. The
sixth star fell at Wimbledon. My brother, keeping watch beside the
women in the chaise in a meadow, saw the green flash of it far beyond
the hills. On Tuesday the little party, still set upon getting across
the sea, made its way through the swarming country towards Colchester.
The news that the Martians were now in possession of the whole of
London was confirmed. They had been seen at Highgate, and even, it was
said, at Neasden. But they did not come into my brother s view until
the morrow.
That day the scattered multitudes began to realise the urgent need of
provisions. As they grew hungry the rights of property ceased to be
regarded. Farmers were out to defend their cattle-sheds, granaries, and
ripening root crops with arms in their hands. A number of people now,
like my brother, had their faces eastward, and there were some
desperate souls even going back towards London to get food. These were
chiefly people from the northern suburbs, whose knowledge of the Black
Smoke came by hearsay. He heard that about half the members of the
government had gathered at Birmingham, and that enormous quantities of
high explosives were being prepared to be used in automatic mines
across the Midland counties.
He was also told that the Midland Railway Company had replaced the
desertions of the first day s panic, had resumed traffic, and was
running northward trains from St. Albans to relieve the congestion of
the home counties. There was also a placard in Chipping Ongar
announcing that large stores of flour were available in the northern
towns and that within twenty-four hours bread would be distributed
among the starving people in the neighbourhood. But this intelligence
did not deter him from the plan of escape he had formed, and the three
pressed eastward all day, and heard no more of the bread distribution
than this promise. Nor, as a matter of fact, did anyone else hear more
of it. That night fell the seventh star, falling upon Primrose Hill. It
fell while Miss Elphinstone was watching, for she took that duty
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